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My wife is in the market for a new road bike, carbon frame and 105 kit or equivalent. We have a great local bike shop, which is very small, but great for repairs, however only carries a handful of bikes in stock, and none in a ladies fit, as the market is so small. They can order in pretty much whatever we want though.
Today we had a trip to another independent bike shop, albeit a 120 mile round trip to get there and back, but they are a much larger outfit and had numerous bikes to physically see, sit on, take for a short spin, including some of the models we had selected as being potentially suitable.
The larger shop were great, it meant my wife could try both sizes and now knows the size she needs. The smaller shop are also great (and will get all the repairs and servicing ) however they couldn’t offer us anything to see in the flesh.
Both shops would need to order a new model, as the spec didn’t fit, but they are readily available from the manufacture.
I would like to support my lbs, but I had great service from the larger less local bike shop, as a result I have an ethical dilemma!
Any thoughts are appreciated!
Buy from the shop that gave you a great sales experience and get it maintained at the shop that gave you the great maintenance experience?
Just a thought
Showrooming is a no-no from me.
Local LBS gets the service work, seems fair.
APF
Buy it from the larger shop, have it delivered to your local shop and have them assemble it and set it up? Everyone is happy!
Not sure how that one would work? They are both independent shops.
What do you mean by independent? It sounds like the larger has accounts with suppliers so could probably arrange direct delivery to the smaller. This would help the larger with their supplier (and price bonus structure) and there would be plenty of margin for the larger to post it to the smaller if it couldn’t arrange direct delivery, they would be saving at least two hours labour on assembly and set up for a start. You would probably have to pay assembly at the smaller? It should be fairly easy to sort in an amicable way.
They are both Giant dealers. If it was a direct sales model where the manufacture sends to the lbs for assembly and a commission it might work, but I can’t see how it would be economically sensible for the larger shop to deliver to the smaller shop!